Monday, January 05, 2009

Cafe de Leche: Highland Park's caffeine oasis

Some longtime NELA folks probably see the opening of Cafe de Leche as the beginning of the end: a sleek modern coffee spot with Intelligentsia Coffee, full of fashionably tousled young folks with deer on their t-shirts. But Cafe de Leche keeps it real with a play area for tots in back and pastries and muffins from Porto's. Owned by Matt Schodorf and his wife Anya, there's a subtle Latin vibe to the cafe, especially when Anya is there making the Nicaraguan pinolio corn drink, which I didn't get to taste. My espresso con panna was just the little jolt of caffeine I needed to finish out the morning, and I ran into Josh from FoodGPS, who had his laptop plugged in to a convenient outlet behind the table, plus there's free WIFI.And the coolest part? I got the bicycle discount for arriving on a bike!Cafe de Leche5000 York Blvd.Highland Park323-551-6828

Wow, that's a bit of punch in the gut for "some of those long time NELA folks." Maybe the reluctance for some of those long time residents is that they want to embrace change and improvements of the community without losing what makes the community so great to begin with. Something that many east side communities have seen white washed with hipsterism while pushing out local flavor.

Yeah, it was a little slow, but they were very nice about it, and I was busy talking, so I didn't really mind. "A punch in the gut," huh? That's kind of strong. It's very easy to rile up folks in this neighborhood, I've found.